"There must be a reason why God gave you a second chance" A miracle gave them a second chance. Will they do things right this time around? -time-travel fic -an eventual kid fic -MSR through and through -smut

Disclaimer: I do not own Mulder, Scully, Skinner, Maggie, Emily or any other characters you might recognize in here (if I did I would not be struggling to pay for college right now). There will be a few OC's but I do not own any of the main characters, nor am I making a profit from this story. It is written purely for the enjoyment of my own overactive imagination and need for Mulder and Scully to be happy and not have to deal with all of the shit that they do in the show. All rights to the characters in this story and other crap go to Fox, 1013, and Chris Carter. You know the whole spiel.

Spoilers: YES. This is a shipper fic. It's also going to eventually be a kid-fic, as well. If you don't like either of these things then it's best to turn back now. The story takes place as an AU canon-divergence that starts a at the end of Millennium and circles back to the very beginning of the show.

The first thing that Dana Scully's senses registered was the gagging smell of burnt rubber. 'Where am I?' Realizing that her head hurt like hell, Scully moved to put her hands against her skull to check for blood- only to be stopped by a weird feeling of paralyzation. 'Why can't I move? Why is it so dark? Are my eyes even open?' Scully heart dropped in her chest. This can't be good.

She thought hard on what the last thing she remembered was… 'Let's see…. I was in the car.. driving Mulder home from the hospital.. it was New Year's Eve… Wait, is it still New Year's Eve? How much time has passed?' Scully tried shifting around again, but quickly realized that she still couldn't move and that her attempts were futile. 'God, where's Mulder? What if he's in trouble, too?' Scully couldn't remember anything past driving Mulder home.

"Dana," a quiet voice faded into Scully's senses. Along with it came a bright white light. It was blinding in its sheer intensity; Scully still couldn't tell whether her eyes were open or not. She seemed to have zero control over her motor functions.

"Dana," the voice called again, louder this time. It sounded like the voice of a small child. A girl maybe.

"Who- Who are you?," Scully tried to ask, only to find that she wasn't able to vocalize her thoughts. 'What is going on?'

"Dana, it's me, Sam."

'How is this possible? How is this person hearing me? Is it a person?' Scully was completely confused and highly scared. But then it clicked- Sam. Sam. Sam, as in Samantha Mulder. "Samantha?" Scully silently asked questioningly.

"Yeah," Samantha giggled. "It's me."

"What's going on? Why can't I speak or move or see? Where am I? Where have you been all these years? Why are you here now? What happened to you?" a myriad of questions ran through Scully head.

"This isn't how you were supposed to end up, Dana." There was a sigh evident in Samantha's voice. "None of this was supposed to have happened. But you didn't listen. Neither of you listened. You ignored and you pushed your feelings away. Your life wasn't supposed to be like this, Dana."

"What are you talking about? Why am I here? What happened to me?" Scully was not about to admit to her feelings for Mulder, especially when she couldn't even see them.

"Dana, you died."

"What?!" Scully felt tears rise up under her eyelids, the emotional response stinging her nose but the tears never actually did fall. She felt sick to her stomach. 'How am I dead? How could this have happened? What about my mother?'

"Stop and let me explain, Dana," Samantha interrupted her thoughts in an urgent tone. "Please, we don't have much time. You died in a car accident on your way home from the hospital. A drunk driver swerved into your lane at 12:27 AM and hit your car head on. You died from a broken neck and excessive blood loss."

"O-Okay.." Scully hesitated, trying to keep her emotions in check. She couldn't believe it. She wasn't ready to die yet.

"God had a plan. He gave you signs. You didn't follow them and neither did Fox. The quest- his quest, your quest- it was never about me. It was about you two. You guys were supposed to find each other, not me. You were supposed to find each other." Samantha let out a long sigh. "He's sending you back, Dana. He's going to show you what your life would have ended up like if you had lived; and then he's going to send you back. Back, so you can fix things. So you can follow the signs. None of this was ever supposed to happen. None of the pain. None of the loss. None of the suffering." Samantha voice slowly faded out until Scully could no longer hear her. 'No, wait!,' she still wasn't able to speak. 'Come back! Come back, Samantha!'

An overwhelming sense of dizziness assaulted Scully senses. It was so strong. Her stomach began to churn. It felt like she was falling weightless through the darkness.

Images began to pop into Scully's mind, like a silent movie that was exclusive to her and her only. They were intense in both their vivid color and the emotional connection that she felt with each scene that played out.

She saw her and Mulder kissing. Her and Mulder falling into bed with each other, blissfully happy.

What came after that devastated her and left her heart resting in her throat: Mulder was taken right when she found out that they were going to have a baby. She searched and searched for him, only to find him beaten, abused, cold, and lifeless a few months later.

She saw herself sobbing alone at his grave. She saw her mother's reaction when she finally mustered up the courage and the strength to tell her that she was carrying the deceased love of her life's child. She was alone. So utterly alone. The only thing there to keep her going was the fact that he left her with a piece of himself.

She saw his rotting body in a hospital bed, only breathing because of ventilators that were doing it for him. She saw the scars that marred his body, the nightmares that plagued his conscience.

She saw him having to leave them, his family, in order to keep the baby safe. She saw the baby being kidnapped. Again. And again. She watched as a very broken version of herself sent her baby boy away to live, be raised, and be loved by people who weren't her and Mulder. She watched as Mulder was convicted of murder. They went on the run together. They hid. And they hid. For years.

Eventually the images stopped and Scully couldn't help but burst out into tears, heavy sobs wracking her body. She wanted Mulder more than anything in the world. But not like that. Not with so much pain and loss to where they wouldn't survive. To where love couldn't possibly be enough.

The echoing sound of her frantic distress called her attention away from her tumultuous emotions. 'What's going on now? Why can I hear all of the sudden?' Birds chirping off into the distance soon became audible to her ears. Peeling one eye open, and then the other, Scully was shocked to find herself in bed, back in her apartment. Her old apartment. Old as in the one that she hadn't lived in for six years.

Scully rolled out of her bed and wandered towards the window where the sun was streaming in unapologetically, it's bright incandescent light filtering in slowly through the blinds. She was completely bewildered. 'How was any of this explainable? How was she back here?'

An idea popped into her brain. Turning around, she took inventory of all of the furniture and knick-knacks in the room. They were all hers. Scully walked into her bathroom and looked into the floor length mirror. What she saw there caused her to be speechless, driving her confusion even deeper. What she saw in the mirror was not a well-put-together FBI agent in her mid-30s. Gone was her short, cropped red hair and her experience-altered facial expression. The person who stood before her was young. She had somewhat long strawberry blonde hair and big, baggy pajamas. This woman looked to be about 28 and was at least ten pounds heavier than the version of herself that she was used to- the version that still, even after two years, couldn't seem to gain back the weight that she lost while she was fighting her cancer.

She raced back into the bedroom, skidding to a halt in front of where the alarm clock was in front of her bed. 8:23 AM, Sunday, March 6, 1992. Scully gasped, taking a few steps backwards, causing her to back to run into the doorway that led out to the kitchen and living room.

If this was true. If God really had sent her back… then that means that she hasn't met Mulder yet. That would happen on Monday. This would mean that her father is still alive. That Missy is still alive. This is her second chance. Her chance to avoid the darkness. To be happy. This is her chance to build a life with only person she could ever imagine spending it with.

"Oh, my God," Scully cried out, dropping down onto her knees, her hands coming up to rest over her eyes, concealing the bout of emotion that was once again sweeping over her emotions. She prayed to God to thank him for letting her come back, for giving her another chance. She'd do it right this time. She didn't want to put her family in danger. She didn't want to put Mulder or herself in danger, either. She wanted a future. A future with Mulder, hopefully. She felt encouraged because of the kiss that he had instigated just before… well, it was ten years in the future now.. 'But what if Mulder doesn't remember me? Will I show up to meet him on Monday and have to rebuild our whole friendship back up. How will I get him to trust me again? How will I keep him safe from his own mind and the Syndicate and the smoking man?'

A knock sounded in from the front door. 'Who could that be,' Scully thought as she got up off of her knees and moved to open it.

The brunette woman of average height and stature breezed past Scully from the other side of the door, not even bothering to stop to greet her sister. "Hey, Danes.. sorry I'm late. You just won't believe the amount of traffic I hit on the way over here. You really need to move, you kno-," the woman stopped rambling as she turned and noticed the awe-stricken look on her little sister's face, not to mention the newly added tear tracks. "Oh, my God. Dana, what's wrong? Why are you staring at me like that?"

Scully's lip quivered as she took in the sight that was, without a doubt, her eccentric big sister, Melissa. She shut the door quietly and then walked right over to Melissa, enveloping her in a bear hug.

"Dana," Melissa inquired worriedly as she felt, rather than heard, Dana sniffle against her shirt. "You're scaring me. What's going on? What's wrong?" Melissa kept repeating herself, anxiously awaiting an answer from her little sister. The same little sister who always had refused to cry in front of other people, out of a false sense of weakness or subordination, she had naturally assumed.

It took a few long minutes before Scully could finally gather her strength enough to speak. "God, Missy. You have no idea how much I've missed you."

"Dana," Missy began in confusion. "But we just saw each other last weekend at Mom's house?"

"You're never going to believe what I'm about to tell you, Missy." Scully grabbed Missy's hand and led her over to the couch. "On second thought, you probably will, knowing you…"

§§§

"Dana, I just can't believe it.," Missy stuttered. "Well, I can.. But I.. just.. wow." There were no other words for it besides that it was extraordinary.

"Um, well I think for one, you're supposed to change some of the events in the past seven years of your history, but not all of them. I think you need to think really hard about what you want and what you think Samantha told you you messed up on the last time around.." Missy paused briefly, carefully considering the weight of what she was about to ask. "What do you want, Dana?"

"I want.." Scully sighed heavily and dropped her head into Missy's lap, carelessly throwing her legs over the arm of the couch. "Oh, God. I want Mulder. And I want us and our family's to be safe. And I want kids… Kids … I had just finally started getting used to the idea of not being able to have kids. But now that I've seen what the baby Mulder and I would have had looks like.. and knowing that it's possible again… since I haven't been abducted yet or had cancer… God, I want kids more than anything." A few seconds went by before she added a quiet, "I hadn't known how much I wanted to be a mom until the choice was taken away from me.."

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